Mexican Pizzas

I'm always looking for new ways to put food we already like together. When I stumbled upon a recipe for a mexican pizza I had flashbacks to the Taco Bell drive through and I knew what I had to attempt!

First I sauteed some yellow onion in extra virgin olive oil and added a little cumin. Then I added a can of rinsed black beans. Then some minced garlic, salt, and pepper. Then some diced cubanelle pepper.

Then I transfered the mix into my food processor and processed away. Mine isn't too strong so it was still pretty thick. Very similar in consistency to refried beans, perfect for mexican pizzas! The onion and pepper really gave the bean mixture some depth.

Then I spread the beans on top of a taco sized tortilla and baked until warm. Then top with some shredded (freshly shredded! buying block cheese is much cheaper and has less additives) cheese, whichever flavor you like.

Broil to brown the edges of the tortillas and melt the cheese.

Top with shredded lettuce, diced tomato, and sour cream. I forgot to take a picture of the finished product because I was in such a hurry to eat them! So imagine the lettuce and tomato on top.

They were seriously delicious. I also made a version with some chicken strips for some friends of mine, if you're weary of vegetarian dinners.

It was nice to have something a little out of the ordinary.

Happy Eating!

Buying a Cow

Well hello long lost blog...

How have you been?

My fingers have been avoiding the keyboard lately. Do you ever feel that way?

I do apologize.

In the world of food right now the biggest thing going on is that I'm hoping and planning on buying a giant hunk of cow! Local food is becoming more and more important to me and Florida has a lot of farms not far from the cities. I've also become increasingly more aware of the way animals are treated, animals that we eat. I believe the old phrase, you are what you eat. So I'd rather not be made of animals that are fed foods their bodies we not designed to digest, pumped full of medicines to help them survive the terrible living conditions they are subjected too. This isn't about judgement or politics... it's just one woman thinking more carefully about what I put into my body.

As much as I love love love saving money it may not be the best idea to cut costs on food alone. American's spend very little of their income on food. I am willing to spend a higher percentage of my income on food and I'm sort of hoping that will help me spend less on medicare and maybe even give me a few extra quality years with my family.

Have any of you bought local organic meat before? What was your experience? What suggestions do you have?

Happy Eating!

Shrimp and Grits

Shrimp are delicious. Grits are delicious. Put them together... double delicious!

Ingredients:

1lb Shrimp

1 can Diced Tomatoes

1 cup Cheddar Cheese

1 cup Grits

1 cup Milk

Green Onions (garnish)

Cayenne Pepper, Salt, Pepper

I cooked the shrimp with the tomatoes and pepper. I cooked the grits according to the directions. Then I added the milk and cheese.

Simple.

I liked it.

Hope you like it too. Tell me how you changed it!

Happy Eating.

GMO

How do you feel about genetically modified foods?

I don't really know how I feel about them... Do you remember learning about Gregor Mendel? if you don't you should read about him! His pea experiment is very interesting. What about when you asked your mom if you planted your apple core and seeds, would an apple tree grow? My mom told me yes, that if I planted my fruit seeds plants would grow.

Basically, as I can understand it, some people decided they would alter the genetic structure of certain plants to create seeds that had desirable traits. Since they had altered the genetic structure of the seed (let's pretend it's my apple) then it isn't really an apple anymore, it's their own breed of fruit that looks like an apple and has advantageous apple qualities, and that person or group of people invented it, so they owned it. Since they invented the "apple look-a-like but not genetically an apple" piece of fruit they can take out a patent on it though the government. If I ate a piece of fruit grown from their seeds and planted the core and grew a fruit tree it would be their tree because they own that breed of fruit.

It makes sense as far as governmental policy is concerned I suppose. but what happens when all the real apples die and all that's left is the "genetically not an apple lookalike" that's owned by a person or group of people? A person can own all the fruit we call apples? That seems strange.

I found this cool website that helps you use your vote to purchase non-GMO foods and stick to the basic publicly owned ones.

Purple Potatoes

Wouldn't it be fun if all vegetables came in our favorite colors? Pink celery maybe? Purple potatoes are a girlie vegetable lover's dream come true!

Look how cute are they?!

I was nervous about buying them, I mean specialty items sometimes seem like the belong on the shelves of Whole Foods and not in my kitchen, but it's a month of facing fears.

Which is why I paired the purple potatoes with the frozen lamb shank. Double fear facing duty.

Hadn't used the slow cooker in a while. I'm not normally a fan of the crock pot... it tends to make all the food taste exactly the same. Maybe I'm just not that good at combining items.

I put some purple, gold, and red potatoes with carrots and celery in the crock pot with beef stock.

The lamb was a little fattier than most of the meat that I cook, but I suppose that goes along with the cut of meat.

The potatoes were so cute and perfect! The purple potatoes are a little sweeter than the regular ones, but not quite as sweet as sweet potatoes. Do they make sweet potatoes in this smaller size?

I'd love to roast sweet potatoes with the purple ones...

Anyway, this is a makeshift recipe but it's how things tend to go in my kitchen.

Happy Eating!

Saving Money!

Publix Original Total: $85.19

Publix Price Savings: $11.82

Coupon Savings: $10.95

New Total: $62.42

It's been a few weeks since I've been talking about coupons because the advertisements have been rather bland. Nothing exciting to talk about.

I had a few good ones this time.

Prego Pasta Sauce was on sale BOGO plus I had a coupon!

Honest Tea was on sale for $1.25 a bottle (individual bottles) plus I had a $2 off coupon if you buy 5.

Coffee Mate Creamer was on sale for $1.50 plus a coupon!

Treasure Cave Crumbled Blue Cheese was on sale for $2.50 plus I printed a coupon!

Spice Island Vanilla Extract was $6.99 for 2oz while McCormick's was $7.49 for 2oz, McCormick's has corn syrup in it plus I had a coupon for $1 off Spice Island. Super Bonus!

Did you get any good deals this week?

Happy Shopping!

a little bitter, a little sweet

Inspired by real simple, yet again, I made some lunch.

Butternut Squash, Kale, and Chicken Breast. I think this combination of foods is excellent; starch, vegetable, and protein.

Roasted butternut squash is tender and sweet and almost squishy in a delightful kind of way.

Kale is tangy bitter and crunchy even after you cook it, unlike collards that get very mushy, Kale withstands the heat very well. Put sweet tender squash with bitter crunchy kale and you have a party in your mouth!

Mouthfeel is money making business these days, with al the artifical foods we try and convince our mouths are real. It's also fascinating, read more about mouthfeel here, or here, or here. Why add gums, chemicals, or starches to something to replicate mouthfeel when the world of real foods already created it for you?

I made some chicken too. Chicken is less exciting for me than vegetables, but I did cook the chicken in a new way. I seared it in the hot cast iron skillet and when the sides were mostly brown I moved the skillet to the 400 degree oven and let the chicken finish cooking (thanks to my handy dandy smart electronic meat thermometer.) This worked splendidly! The chicken was moist and tender and not like eating a stringy rock, which has sometimes happened to my

chicken of the past. Overcooked chicken may be guaranteed salmonella free but it isn't that delicious.

Real Simple's recipe called for bone in pork instead of chicken, does anyone love bone in pork, should I have tried it?

Happy Eating!

Help!

This is a somewhat different post for me.

you know I'm all about saving money but I normally only talk about it in relation to food.

but tonight I checked our utilities bill online.

You don't know much about the size of our house or whatever but for some background last month our bill was about $130. The month before maybe $140. In the heat of summer when I can't take it and the air conditioning is going hard core it can be $220.

It said our current amount due was $330. more usage than we have ever had in this apartment.

We haven't changed our lifestyle, I didn't decorate with Christmas lights, I didn't crank the heat to create a sauna. Is it possible that this is a mistake? Has anyone had this before?

Can utility companies make mistakes?

Someone give me some pointers.

Thanks.

Happy not-having-a-panic-attack!

Kale Spinach Pear Smoothie

via Joy the Baker who is very inspiring and you should read her blog because she is an amazing baker. she normally talks about butter and sugar and of course I believe her when she says it is delicious. but a Kale Spinach Smoothie, are you sure Joy?

I love the idea of eating dark leafy green vegetables at breakfast time. I love the idea of eating them all the time really, but hiding them in a smoothie is genius. Cooking greens can reduce some of the nutritional content but I've never heard that pulverizing them does.

I used:

1 cup spinach

1 cup kale

1/2 pear

1 small to medium banana (joy uses frozen but I'm super impatient so mine was 'cold')

1 1/2 cups of organic skim milk (joy uses almond milk which I didn't have)

1 tbsp Agave Nectar (joy uses honey but I dislike honey)

Here is my link to approximate basic nutritional content. The smoothie was really good, thick and even Chris liked it!

Happy Eating!

Pumpkin Muffins Shaped Like Cookies

I attempted more baking. Facing those fears!

The experiment was Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies. The original recipie did say they turned out fluffy and I meant to decrease the baking soda a little, but then I totally forgot to do that.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1 stick of butter, room temp.

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg, room temp.

15 oz can of pure pumpkin

1 tsp vanilla extract

chocolate chips!

Directions:

Step 1: Wisk dry ingredients.

Step 2: Beat butter, brown sugar, and white sugar.

Step 3: Add pumpkin, vanilla, and egg

Step 4: Stir in chocolate chips

Step 5: Form cookies and Bake

Step 6: Eat!

I even tasted one already and yes they are baked through and totally edible! They are really more like muffins and I might suggest making them in a mini muffin pan. I also sprinkled unsweetened cocoa powder on top of some of them and that was good! I only had about a half a bag of chocolate chips and I kind of wish I would have added more because the chocolate was good!

Happy Eating!